The FCC’s “half-pregnant” plan for net neutrality, and why it won’t work

by Jeff John Roberts 41 MINS AGO

SUMMARY: The FCC has dropped a big hint about how it will resolve the vexing net neutrality question: its solution sounds like a clever compromise, but will do nothing to stop internet fast lanes.

-- The FCC’s in a tough place as it rewrites rules for the internet: the public wants a ban on “fast lanes” — the idea of letting ISPs charge websites for priority service — but the powerful telecom industry is determined to create those lanes anyways. In response, the agency is reportedly planning a “hybrid approach.” That phrase rings of compromise and good sense but, in reality, will produce the same legal train wreck that placed the FCC in this mess in the first place.

If you’re catching up, the “hybrid” news comes via a detailed leak to the Wall Street Journal in which the agency appears to be setting the table for its impending final rules:

Caught in the middle, Mr. Wheeler is close to settling on a hybrid approach, people close to the chairman say (…)

The plan now under consideration would separate broadband into two distinct services: a retail one, in which consumers would pay broadband providers for Internet access; and a back-end one, in which broadband providers serve as the conduit for websites to distribute content. The FCC would then classify the back-end service as a common carrier, giving the agency the ability to police any deals between content companies and broadband providers.

-- Earlier this week the research consortium M-Lab released a big report on the way data moves through the guts of our internet infrastructure. It focused on interconnection points, the shared equipment nodes where different networks exchange data so that it can move around the world and into your home. What it showed was that business disputes — between transit ISPs like Cogent and Level, which carry data around the world, and access ISPs like Verizon and Comcast, which carry it the last mile to your home — were having a dramatic effect on the ability of many American consumers and businesses to access the internet, reducing the flow of data to the point where even basic tasks like email would be slow or impossible.

THE SAME DATA MEANS PROVIDES EVIDENCE FOR TWO OPPOSITE CONCLUSIONS

This was important new research that highlighted how strained the infrastructure underpinning our internet is. But depending on which side of the business dispute you sit on, the data showed two very different things. For ISP advocates, the data was clear evidence that Netflix was to blame for the degradation in service. For ISP opponents, the data was clear evidence that Comcast and Verizon were trying to punish Netflix, and harming others in the process. But as the author of the M-Lab study argues, that heated argument is causing them to miss the forest for the trees.

The FCC’s “half-pregnant” plan for net neutrality, and why it won’t work

by Jeff John Roberts 41 MINS AGO

SUMMARY: The FCC has dropped a big hint about how it will resolve the vexing net neutrality question: its solution sounds like a clever compromise, but will do nothing to stop internet fast lanes.

-- The FCC’s in a tough place as it rewrites rules for the internet: the public wants a ban on “fast lanes” — the idea of letting ISPs charge websites for priority service — but the powerful telecom industry is determined to create those lanes anyways. In response, the agency is reportedly planning a “hybrid approach.” That phrase rings of compromise and good sense but, in reality, will produce the same legal train wreck that placed the FCC in this mess in the first place.

If you’re catching up, the “hybrid” news comes via a detailed leak to the Wall Street Journal in which the agency appears to be setting the table for its impending final rules:

Caught in the middle, Mr. Wheeler is close to settling on a hybrid approach, people close to the chairman say (…)

The plan now under consideration would separate broadband into two distinct services: a retail one, in which consumers would pay broadband providers for Internet access; and a back-end one, in which broadband providers serve as the conduit for websites to distribute content. The FCC would then classify the back-end service as a common carrier, giving the agency the ability to police any deals between content companies and broadband providers.

SUMMARY: After President Obama came out with a surprise call for net neutrality, Verizon struck back with a new lawsuit threat. But the case for net neutrality is on solid legal ground — it’s the political case that’s now shaky. Here’s why.

The father of net neutrality thinks the President's on the right track

By Nilay Patel on November 10, 2014 12:20 pm @reckless

-- It's huge news today that President Obama has come out in support of strong net neutrality and open internet rules based on Title II of the Telecommunications Act. But while the basics are simple, there's lots to understand underneath the surface, so I called Tim Wu, the man who originally coined the phrase net neutrality, for some quick insight. Here's our conversation, lightly edited for clarity.

-- Republicans just dominated Democrats in the midterm elections, and by all popular accounts Obama may become one of the lamest lame ducks in history — the GOP simply hates the guy and it seems unlikely he's going to get anything meaningful done before he leaves office. So we're now entering the presidential "say whatever you want" phase, marked today by the president's strong new stance on rigorous net neutrality regulation. Republican leadership was quick to respond:

"Net Neutrality" is Obamacare for the Internet; the Internet should not operate at the speed of government.

— Senator Ted Cruz (@SenTedCruz) November 10, 2014

This is an insanely cynical tactic that should worry all citizens regardless of political stripe, and it's coming from the guys at the top; Ted Cruz (R-TX) is a powerful member of the GOP in the Senate and a potential presidential candidate for 2016. Republicans just took over Congress and hold the keys to policymaking for at least the next two years. If the best they can continue to come up with is repeating "Obama is bad!" the internet is in serious trouble.

Net neutrality is obviously nothing like Obamacare, but Cruz and his colleagues have already demonstrated they either don't understand what internet freedom means or they're willing to spread mendacious propaganda about it to help their friends at Verizon, Comcast, and other monopolistic ISPs.